There was an interesting Q & A Session with the CEO of Fairfax and News Limited there. They were frank but not that open.
They mentioned a few points that I thought were notable.
1) There are fewer outlets for newspapers today than five years ago. I am sure it is subagents that is the cause of this. It may explain in part why although newspaper circulation in newsagencies has not dropped as much as overall circulation.
2) They are considering raising the cover price. This did surprise me.
3) The internet as it is, is not favourable to them. They pay about 30% commission to Apple, and I am sure that Apple gets the details of their client base but apparently they only rarely. Effectively, they do not get a client base out of the net.
4) They do not know where they will be in ten years.
In a sense, they are worse off than a newsagent. A newsagent can after all change his product mix, the newspaper companies cannot.
